“Will you shut up, man?” “You graduated either the lowest or the next lowest in your class, don’t ever use the word ‘smart’ with me!”, “Maybe you could inject some bleach in your arm.”, “It’s hard to get any word in with this clown.”
…no, this is not an argument between two heated-up highschool teenagers – this is the first debate between the current President of the United States, Donald Trump, and his main contestant for the upcoming elections – the former Vice President of the country – Joe Biden.
In a little over an hour and a half, Trump and Biden “debated” over the future direction of the US economy, healthcare, social situation, and other pressing matters. Needless to say, “debated” is a powerful word for what took place.
In reality, it was more like an hour and a half of ridiculous remarks, completely off-topic from the matter at hand, absurd interruptions, and a complete lack of any conversational etiquette. At some point, the moderator had to raise his voice in a futile attempt to get both contestants back on point.
It would be a fool’s errand to try and declare a winner between Trump and Biden coming out of this debate. Seema Mehta, a political reporter, summarized the first round of the conversation:
If this opening sets the tone for the rest of the night, voters will be the ultimate losers in tonight’s debate.
Fortunately, there was another side to it – one that genuinely won. Bitcoin.
Well, for once, Trump really did prove that he can speak louder than Biden. In any case, some of the highlights from Biden were that he managed to make his top points. He argued that Trump’s court nominee threatens the healthcare system, while also attacking Trump’s record on the COVID-19 crisis.
Following a relatively unproductive segment, things took a turn for the worst when they started discussing families and personal matters. Biden attacked Trump, arguing that he only paid $750 in federal income taxes in two recent years while Trump bashed Biden’s so for his work overseas.
In any case, in terms of economic planning, Biden’s approach is oriented to the middle class and has introduced policies to “ease the economic burden on working people.”
Speaking at a rally to kick off his campaign, Biden said that:
“This country wasn’t built by Wall Street bankers and CEOs and hedge fund managers. It was built by the American middle class.”
During the debate, he touched upon this a few times, outlining that millionaires and billionaires did very well during the crisis because of the bailouts and the tax cuts. He said that Trump’s entire attention was on the market while he ignored the regular working people.
Trump, on the other hand, pointed out that he’s done a great deal to prompt the fast recovery of the economy following the coronavirus-induced stock market crash in mid-March.
In any case, it’s hard to even come up with proper highlights of this debate, though it’s clear that their political views are astronomically different in most areas. Making a choice shouldn’t be hard for anyone with a certain ideology, but this debate surely did little favor to either of the contestants.
Following the clash, some of the more popular Bitcoin proponents came out with a simple conclusion.
It’s easy to see why this is true. For what is worth, the only thing that I felt watching this whole thing is uncertainty. Political, economic, and social uncertainty.
It’s true that the US economy has recovered from the coronavirus-induced crash. It’s true that major indices such as the NASDAQ are recording all-time high values. But it’s also true that there were over 40 million US job losses as the pandemic was announced.
In just a few months after that, the US Government has printed trillions of dollars, essentially devaluing the national currency, calling to question its global reserve currency status.
Now, it’s also true that Bitcoin has shown a serious correlation with stocks during the pandemic, and it also tanked to around $3,600. Naturally, it marked a very quick recovery and even surged to yearly highs above $12,000.
The price aside, Bitcoin’s inherent qualities look more attractive now more than ever. Irrespective of who the next president will be, the US is in for a wild ride over the next few years as this crisis is far from being over.
While the economy might appear seemingly recovered, the excess of US dollars is something that will be paid in the years to come.
All of this makes Bitcoin’s scarcity a lot more appealing. After all, you can’t print it away whenever you want to bail out failing CEOs, as Chamath Palihapitiya put it.
Featured image background courtesy of Bloomberg.
